


ONWRD

by raikotoho



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, Road Trips, Sisters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:00:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26350801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raikotoho/pseuds/raikotoho
Summary: The quest had been Ruby’s idea. She was the one who’d called it that too, a quest, and Yang had laughed.“Come on, Ruby, what do you think she was looking for? The Holy Grail?”
Relationships: Ruby Rose & Yang Xiao Long
Kudos: 5





	ONWRD

The quest had been Ruby’s idea. She was the one who’d called it that too, a _quest_ , and Yang had laughed.

“Come on, Ruby, what do you think she was looking for? The Holy Grail?”

Ruby had flipped carefully through the pages of Mom’s old notebook, wondering for the hundredth time what had been so important to her. “Well, maybe she was,” she’d said, “you don’t know.”

“Bet Dad does.”

“But he’s not back for another week!” Ruby had protested. “That’s way too long!”

“Fine, fine,” Yang had laughed again, and slapped a helmet onto Ruby’s head. “Okay, sis, onward ho.”

Ruby was very grateful to have a wonderful sister who would drop everything to go on epic road trips with her. She was also grateful for the helmet, as they were now twelve minutes and counting into a high-speed chase through the forests of Anima.

“Corner!” Yang warned, barely audible over the roar of the wind and the engine.

“Okay!” Ruby yelled back, and matched Yang’s lean into the turn. The sunset-colored bike whipped around a thick grove of trees, and a few seconds passed before the battered Jeep came back into view, visibly puffing exhaust fumes. Assured by their lead, Ruby turned her attention to the road ahead and shouted, “Go left!”

Yang immediately cut across the other lane and started down a gently sloping dirt path. “Did we lose them?!”

Ruby squinted through the dusty curtain that followed them. “Not yet, but they’re falling behind!” The boxy vehicle was barely contained on the narrow path, scraping against a rising wall of earth on one side while chancing a rollover on the other. Bumblebee was more agile, and Yang handled her speed with the ease of far too many street races.

“Perfect!” Yang called. “Lemme know when they’re out of sight and I’ll find a place to duck out!”

Playing rear scout on a motorcycle wasn’t as easy as it sounded. Twisting to check on the Jeep, Ruby was so distracted by keeping her seat that she almost missed the stony lump zipping by at the edge of the road.

Hah, that was funny, it almost looked like a—

“Yang! We have to turn back!”

“What?” Yang said. “Why?!”

“That rock was shaped like a bird!” Ruby shouted. _Bird stone trail_ , she could see the page lined with familiar handwriting like it was right in front of her.

“Well that’s great, Ruby, but this isn’t exactly the best time for a selfie!”

“It’s the next clue!” They were still racing full tilt down the road, farther and farther away from the trail marker. Ruby’s arms tightened. “We’re almost at the end of Mom’s notes!”

“Are you serious?” Yang turned her head to check the mirrors.

Ruby knew it was a lot to ask. The one-lane path didn’t leave any space to squeeze by the Jeep, and going off-road was chancy—Bumblebee was a loyal steed, but there was only so much terrain a sport bike could handle. Still, she had to get to that trail. “They’re far enough back, we might still have time!”

She felt Yang exhale, then draw in a deep breath. “Alright, I guess we’re doing this!” She hit the brake. Bumblebee’s front wheel kicked up off the ground, and they pivoted to land facing the way they came. The instant both wheels were touching dirt, Yang twisted the throttle.

They shot down the middle of the path at top speed, with the Jeep bearing down on them in a deeply unbalanced game of chicken. Ruby pressed into Yang’s back, heart pounding, eyes locked on the stone. She hurriedly compared distances, hopes sinking when she realized they weren’t going to make it.

“Yang—”

“Hold on!”

They were so close now, she could see the missing tooth in the driver’s sneer. Four seconds, three—

Just before the collision, Yang dragged the handlebars to the left and accelerated up the slope. Ruby instinctively shifted her weight to counterbalance the motorcycle’s tilt, and felt a grin widening on her face as they sailed past the Jeep and its dumbstruck occupants.

Yang let out an exhilarated whoop. “Try and catch us now!”

Then they were curving back down, popping off the makeshift ramp and bouncing a little as they settled, which probably wasn’t great for the suspension but that didn’t matter, they’d made it and it had been—

“So! Cool!” Ruby yelled, feeling Yang laugh in response.

“Uh, yeah, who do you think I am?” She slowed, taking the turn onto Bird Stone Trail.

Ruby checked on their pursuers. The Jeep was stopped a good few yards past the trail marker, with no room to turn. Picking up the chase would take enough time that they were pretty much home free already. Go team! Victory was sweet and smelled a little like car exhaust.

“So how close are we, exactly?” Yang asked.

Bumblebee cruised gently along at ten miles an hour, the engine’s quiet rumble letting them talk without shouting. The trail was bumpy and speckled with gravel, and they had to duck under the occasional encroaching tree branch.

“There’s only one clue left,” Ruby said, “but I’m not sure what it means. It just says ‘crooked tree’ and there’s an exclamation point after it.”

“Mysterious,” Yang agreed.

A few minutes later, she said, “Think that’s it over there?”

“What’s it?” Ruby asked.

“The crooked tree.” Yang pointed.

Ruby looked. The tree was crooked alright, but she didn’t see anything nearby worth an exclamation, just more trees.

“I don’t know,” she said doubtfully, “I was expecting something a little more excit—”

An earthshaking thud cut her off, and Yang braked in surprise. “What was that?!”

There was a log behind them that definitely hadn’t been there before, several times Ruby’s height and wider than her arm was long, quivering upright in the middle of the path.

“Ohhh,” Ruby said, “this must be the exclamation point.”

Yang said flatly, “What the f—”

The log began to tilt, and the rest of Yang’s words were lost in the sudden roar of the engine as she gunned it down the trail. Ruby jumped at the second, louder boom, and loosened her grip enough to look upward.

“Good news!” she declared, “It doesn’t look like there are any more traps!” That had been a treasure-hunter trap if she’d ever seen one—no one could deny they were on a quest _now_!

Yang didn’t take the report as well as expected. “Ruby, you need to bail!”

“Huh?” Ruby peered around her sister’s wild, blonde hair and saw that their path was blocked by a rapidly approaching wall.

“Now!” Yang braked, but the bike skidded on loose gravel and began to wobble dangerously. Ruby threw herself from the seat, tucking in her arms and rolling when she hit the ground. She staggered upright, mildly bruised, just in time to watch Yang drop Bumblebee into a sideways slide and plow right into the log barrier with a metallic crash and the sound of splintering wood.

“Yang!” Ruby sprinted toward the wreck. Her sister’s hair and bright yellow helmet stood out against the debris—she’d managed to jump clear at the last second. “Are you okay?”

“I’m good, I’m fine.” Yang sat up, waving off Ruby’s help. Her clothes were ripped and dirty, and there were scrapes on one leg and her right cheek. “Just need a minute.”

“Are you sure?” Ruby hovered anxiously, trying to see if her sister was hiding any other injuries. “What kind of person puts a wall in the middle of nowhere, anyway?” she asked indignantly.

“The kind of person who doesn’t like visitors,” a voice said.

Ruby and Yang looked up into cold, red eyes. A dark-haired woman emerged from the hole Bumblebee had made, carrying a long blade casually in one hand. A gaggle of men and women spilled out behind her, all holding weapons of their own. Ruby looked from heavy pipe wrenches to nail-studded baseball bats to anticipatory smirks, and gulped.

“Now, why don’t we show our guests just how much we value our privacy?”

“Wait!” Ruby said frantically. “Please, we didn’t mean to break your wall! It was an accident!”

The thugs stepped forward. Ruby stepped back. Yang lurched to her feet and took the boxing stance that Dad had taught her.

“One move,” she snarled. “Just try it.”

“No, no one move!” Ruby pleaded. Yang was in no condition to fight now, especially against so many opponents. “Right, Yang? We can just talk it out with Miss, um…”

The red-eyed woman held up a hand. “Do you know who I am?”

“No?” Ruby said, and, remembering the fates of every action movie character who knew too much, hastily added, “We don’t know anything at all, so there’s no reason you can’t let us leave.”

“I find it difficult to believe you just stumbled across our camp,” the woman said. “How did you find us?”

“Our mom,” Ruby explained, feeling a little more hopeful about their chances. “She left these directions—we didn’t know you were here, I swear, we just wanted to find what she was looking for.”

A moment passed in silence. Then, the woman sheathed her sword, and all her followers immediately backed off. Ruby barely stopped herself from cheering aloud.

“Well, you found me,” the woman said. She turned and started back towards the wall.

What? “You know our mom?” Ruby blurted out.

“Who are you?” Yang demanded at the same time.

“My name is Raven Branwen,” she said without looking back, “you two might as well come in.”

Raven Branwen was undoubtedly the One In Charge of this camp filled with people whose source of income Ruby didn’t want to think too much about. Within minutes, she had the cooks preparing a feast, Bumblebee picked up and brought to the garage, and Yang in a private tent with a surplus of medical supplies.

“I’m good,” Yang said firmly. “I don’t need help.” She gave Raven, standing at the entrance of the tent, a challenging stare from her seat on top of an old-fashioned storage trunk.

Ruby edged up next to her sister with a wet rag, and Yang batted it away. “Ruby, stop, I can handle it. I don’t need a doctor.”

“Suit yourself,” Raven said in her cool voice. “Then I’ll see you at the dinner bell.” The thick leather flap fell shut behind her.

Ruby grinned as she found a spot by the little coffee table. “She’s nice, isn’t she?”

“Sure,” Yang said. She carefully removed her right boot and began cutting away the ruined pant leg with scissors from the very well-stocked first aid kit.

“I mean, I didn’t really think so at first,” Ruby offered. “Like, she was actually really scary? But, you know, she’s fixing Bumblebee and she gave us all this doctor stuff and there’s gonna be cookies at the feast, even though we broke her wall.”

Yang grunted. She’d moved on to cleaning the scrapes, pouring a bubbling solution over her leg.

“And this place seems pretty cool, like camping, but better,” Ruby was rambling. “Although if we’re going to be here a while we should probably try calling Dad and seeing if he has service yet.”

That got Yang’s attention. “You’re planning on staying?”

Ruby frowned. “Aren’t you?”

“Why? Bumblebee’s in good enough shape to make it to a real garage. And you know we’re not going to find anything here about Mom.”

“Well,” Ruby said, “we found _your_ mom.” It hadn’t been hard to put the pieces together. Raven’s name matched their not-so-honorary Uncle Qrow. The shape of her face was familiar—Yang had Dad’s coloring, but not his features. And her eyes…

“Yeah.” Yang was unsurprised. She had figured it out too.

“I bet she has all kinds of stories,” Ruby enthused, “stuff Dad and Uncle Qrow never told us!”

“Uh huh.” Yang tore off a strip of tape and busied herself securing the gauze on her leg.

Ruby hesitated. “Yang,” she eventually said, “ _do_ you want to stay?”

“Sure we can stay,” Yang said.

“But you don’t want to.”

“I said it was fine,” Yang said.

Ruby went to sit next to her on the trunk. “Yang…” When she didn’t get a response, she reached over and prodded her sister in the stomach.

“C’mon, Ruby, I’m injured!” Yang scooted away.

“What’s wrong?” Ruby asked. “Don’t you want to get to know your mom?”

“Some mom,” Yang scoffed. She was trying to be lighthearted, but now Ruby recognized the bitterness to her words—the same bitterness that had been present the whole time they’d been in the camp.

She sat in silence for a moment, not sure what to say. Why was Yang so upset? Sure, Raven hadn’t made the best first impression, but she’d done a lot for them in the short time they’d…known her…

Oh.

“Okay,” Ruby said, jumping to her feet and going for the first aid kit. “I’m just gonna fix that up,” she gestured to the painful-looking mark on Yang’s cheek, “and then we’ll go.”

“Go?” Yang asked, taken aback. “I thought you wanted to stay.”

“Yeah, but you don’t,” Ruby said.

“I never said—”

“Nope!” Ruby interrupted. “This is happening, so just be quiet and deal with it!”

Yang slowly relaxed, turning her head to give Ruby better access to the injury. “Thanks, Rubes.”

“Got your back, sis,” Ruby chirped in reply. Yang had been there, supporting her, for her entire life. It was only fair she return the favor.

Even if they were going to miss the cookies at the feast.


End file.
